Kidco BabySteps 123 Natural Feeding System Review and Giveaway - CLOSED

About a month ago now, we decided (along with Rosemary’s Pediatrician) to make the big girl leap up to solids! She was just over 5 months, pretty tiny and still having trouble with gaining weight. Every Pediatrician is different, but we went with what her Pediatrician thought was best for her. Please consult with your child’s Pediatrician before beginning any new diet with your child.

We first started with oatmeal and after two weeks of that Rosemary started veggies! Now my personal decision was to make my own food for her as I’ve heard it’s cheaper and some babies find it even a bit tastier as well. I was given the opportunity to make my own food using Kidco’s BabySteps 123 Natural Feeding System and was very excited about making Rosemary’s first veggies and fruits. I’ve been using the Feeding System for about three weeks now and I’m of course going to share my journey with my readers!

Kidco was formed in 1992 specializing in child, pet and hearth safety gates. Today, they have branched out to make even more advanced safety gates, a variety of home safety products for baby proofing, bed rails, Peapods (travel beds for infants and children), and BabySteps 123 Natural Feeding System.

(How I received the Natural Feeding System - nice and boxed up)

The Kidco Natural Feeding System consists of three parts, hence the BabySteps 123. The first part is preparation. This includes simple to use anywhere, non electric Food Mill and then the Electric Food Mill which needs to be plugged in to use. The second part is storage. The Feeding System comes with two freezer trays which are divided up into 7, 2 oz sections along with a locking lid preventing spills. The third part is feeding. An included spoon, lid, and feeding dish which has three sections preventing mixing of foods and this is especially great for on the go. When I received the Natural Feeding System from Kidco and it included the food mill, a carrying case for the food mill, electric food mill, BabySteps 123 handbook to preparing healthy baby food, two freezer trays and the Feeding Dish. I really liked how it came packaged as all of the parts come in nice boxes for individual storing if I wanted.

The Handbook consists of an introduction to making homemade food, instructions on preparation, storage and feeding baby, food suggestions and recipes, and some pages to keep a feeding diary. I found this book to be very helpful. Rosemary’s pediatrician gave us a small handout on what foods to start with, but that was pretty much it. I really liked all the recipes listed for different fruits, vegetables, and even some full meals. I’ve only made four vegetables so far, but I look forward to using the other helpful tips on purees this book has to offer. I followed this book, but only did the veggies that my daughter’s pediatrician Okayed for her age of five to six months. From what I read, it was pretty similar to what her doctor recommended, but when it comes to her health and nutrition I always do as the pediatrician says first. The book even says to consult with your child’s doctor along with using the book.

I’m not going to go too into the recipes as that would take up a lot of room and people may or may not already have some they want to use either from a parent or another site, but I found these recipes to be easy and Rosemary seemed to think they were tasty!

(Food Mill)

We did sweet potatoes first and per the book it recommends using the non electric food mill for these. The food mill I have a mixed review on. The food mill consists of the mill body, the cutter, handle, a spoon and a nice carrier. It has simple instructions and was easy to assemble. It took a few rounds for me to figure out how much water to add to the potatoes to get the right consistency, but it was overall very easy to use. I did make a little mess with the mill. It was the water that made the mess, which is why I probably won’t be bringing it on the go until we’re onto not adding the water to purees. It’s fairly easy when cranking the handle to go a little too fast and the water can splash out. The only negative thing I have to say is that I found it difficult to get the handle/crank locked into place and undone when adding more vegetables and water for the next rounds of potatoes. I had to use a toothpick to help me turn the crank into place. I couldn’t get this to do it without making more of a mess unfortunately and it caused water to splash all over. I’m not sure if there’s a trick to getting the crank locked in and out better, but I had difficulty with this. Once Rosemary is on to not even needing water added, this will be fairly mess free in my opinion. This was very easy to clean as I just rinsed and put all parts in the top rack of the dishwasher.

(Electric Food Mill before and after blending. Note how the center comes out for easier access of the pureed veggies.)

For the rest of the vegetables I’ve made (squash, carrots, and zucchini), I have used the electric food mill. I have nothing but great things to say about this mill. It’s so easy to assemble, as soon as you add the top (the motor) it turns on, so it’s really easy to work, and also extremely easy to clean. The electric mill consists of the base, the two cup bowl, the blade, the blending attachment, the lid and then the motor. Like the first mill, very simple to put together and easy to use. For all the food I just left the blending attachment on as Rosemary is just beginning to eat solids and I wanted it fairly smooth for her still. As she begins to eat more lumpy foods, I may leave it off for a thicker consistency. All you do is add the food and add the lid and motor and after a few seconds of blending, the food is ready. Very fast and easy as well as zero mess. One of my favorite parts about this mill is that the blade comes right out of the bowl so you can easily get out all of the food with little waste. If I had used a regular blender, this isn’t the case and I’d be digging around trying to get the food to come out. I really like this feature of the mill. Cleanup after was extremely fast with this too. I rinsed the mill quickly and then put it in the top rack of my dishwasher. For carrots, I hand washed as carrots stain everything I’ve found. The only part that’s unable to go in the dishwasher was the motor and that didn’t get dirty at all. This mill is my favorite and I’m sure when I’m home making food, this will be my go to mill as it’s less mess and faster than the non electric mill.

The storage trays I also love! I used both the included storage trays and regular ice cube trays just so I could compare the two. The storage trays that come with are so much more convenient and easier to use as well. With the ice cube trays I filled it up and covered with both saran wrap and foil as I wanted to keep the food from spilling or things for getting in. The storage trays have a very easy to use lid that locks into place so I didn’t have to waste the saran wrap or foil or worry about spills. After the food was frozen and I went to get the food out, the storage trays won hands down when it comes to ease of getting it out. The ice cube trays were very hard to get all of the pieces out and took me several minutes of twisting and turning them to convince the pieces to come out. The storage trays I maybe had to do it for a minute. Since there’s only two of these included in the feeding system, I’m actually planning to go and buy another set of two of these trays so I can make more food at once.

The feeding dish is nice as well. I mostly used it to bring food out with us so it didn’t blend with Rosemary’s oatmeal. The locking lid didn’t allow any blending, so I was happy with the way it traveled. What’s really nice about it is that the storage tray sections and the dish sections are the same size so I could just add it to the dish and it fit perfectly to thaw. This is also dishwasher safe and cleaned very well.

Overall, I have had a very good experience with BabySteps 123 and look forward to continue to making Rosemary’s food with it! My only complaint was with the crank/handle on the food mill, and that surely isn’t enough for me to not recommend buying this system. I found it very easy to assemble, to use, and to clean.

If you currently make your own baby food or are interested in starting, this is a great product for you! The price of this feeding system at my local Buy Buy Baby is $64.99 but it may vary depending on where you purchase. I think this is a great deal for everything you receive with this feeding system. If you aren’t interested in the whole feeding system, the separate parts are also available for individual purchase. You can check out Kidco’s website here to find out where to purchase either online or in a store near you.

(Home made sweet potatoes were a hit! So unhappy when they're are all gone!)

If you’d like to get this whole feeding system for free, Kidco has generously offered one of my readers the entire BabySteps 123 Natural Feeding System I received!

Main Entry – To be eligible to win the Natural Feeding System from Kidco, you must go to the Kidco website and return here telling me a fact about another product you'd love to check out from Kidco and why (other than the feeding system). That’s it. Leave that in a comment along with your email so I may contact you if you’re the winner.

Extra Entries – These entries are not mandatory, but are for those readers that wish to increase the chances of them winning the BabySteps 123 System. You must do the Main Entry first before these extra entries to be eligible to win. Remember to leave a separate comment for any and all entries and to leave an email address so I can contact you.

1. Follow my blog publicly via Google Connect (over on the right side bar). You must follow publicly in order for this to count. Current followers just have to write that you already follow me. (2 entries, leave two separate comments for this one) Please let me know what email and name you are following under.

2. Follow me on twitter

3. Tweet about this giveaway. Please leave a URL where I can check that you tweeted. This can be done once a day to earn many extra entries. Leave a URL for every tweet please. Copy and paste the following tweet:
"Enter to #win a Kidco BabySteps 123 Natural Feeding System over at @AMamaStorkKnows http://bit.ly/a8AWA6 #giveaway RT"

4. Blog about this giveaway. Please leave a direct URL to the blog entry. (2 entries, leave two separate comments)

5. Join my blogfrog community and comment in the forum.

Giveaway is open to entrants in the U.S. and Canada only, and ends on May 13, 2010 at 11:59pm EST. A comment number will be drawn at random from random.org. Winner will be contacted by email and have 48 hours to respond. If I don't hear back, another winner will be selected.


I was provided with this product free of charge by the highlighted company and/or its PR agency in order to test the product first hand and to provide you with my personal opinion on it. The opinions I have provided are mine and mine alone. I am in no way required to write a positive review and my review was not influenced in any way by monetary means. Please investigate before any and all purchases as I am not liable nor responsible for any losses or damages you may incur. Please read my Terms of Use before entering this contest.